


not everything is lost after all

by jaembinn



Category: TOMORROW X TOGETHER | TXT (Korea Band)
Genre: Choi Soobin-Centric, Don't worry, Fluff, Gen, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, kinda angsty, quarantine sucked, their relationship is a plot twist here, they're really cute, this kinda clapped tho, yeonjun best kid, yes it's based on my own quarantine experiences
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-24
Updated: 2020-05-24
Packaged: 2021-03-02 21:40:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,417
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24353746
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jaembinn/pseuds/jaembinn
Summary: In which Choi Soobin feels like his emotions are toppling all over, and guess who's his go-to happy pill contact for that?
Relationships: Choi Soobin/Choi Yeonjun
Comments: 5
Kudos: 60





	not everything is lost after all

**Author's Note:**

> TRIGGER WARNING: panic attack

To think that Soobin has been feeling off lately is definitely not an understatement. He is off. There isn’t any _on_ switch button for him, these last few days are total dicks. There’s this geography project from school where he had to record himself talking about Gwangju (his teacher had told the students to pick any city from South Korea) but he procrastinated too much, he ended up doing it when it’s due. Results? He was literally _scrambling_ , because apparently recording yourself is really hard especially when you stutter every two seconds. Results? He finished recording and editing it at 9 P.M, three hours left. Results? His wifi sucked, he couldn’t email the video to his teacher fast enough, hence the silent panic attack. Results? He had to send a Kakao Talk message to his teacher (yes, Mr. Kang is close with Soobin) and he apologized, saying that if the email doesn’t arrive before midnight, he at least had sent him a screenshot of the Gmail page loading like ass. Weirdly enough, Mr. Kang didn’t tolerate him well enough that night.

(“I’ve given this task to your class since two weeks ago, Soobin-ssi. Where were you?”

He could only wince.)

Two minutes before it’s due, Soobin is _blessed_. The wifi worked, and the email was sent straight to Mr. Kang’s account and he just sat there on his seat, muttering a small _god, thank you_ and he smiled a bit to himself. He realized he had been working hard today.

Actually, maybe not just today. These last _two_ months of quarantine made him feel like he’s on a working field, or sitting in an office, or a farmer harvesting rice fields only to give the shit ton of rice to rich people and he didn’t have the chance to have the rice for _himself_. He’s breaking sweat just to do these assignments on time, especially now that his teachers had reminded the students with some side issues of little importance that sound like, “You have to do all of the assignments or else you won’t get to graduate.”

It’s bullshit, he knows that. His school would’ve dropped down low in terms of “South Korea’s Top 5 High Schools” rank if they just put on a blacklist note on the majority of the students, they wouldn’t want that. It’s total bullshit, but Soobin knows he had to finish all of them. He knows not to skip any of them since his _mother_ told him not to.

Great, family stuff. Okay.

As much as he prefers to stay silent at school and not try to climb up socially, _home_ doesn’t feel that homey ever since the quarantine started. His noona doesn’t live in the same house anymore, which is a total bummer because she’d back him up over anyone all day. His brother is here, though, but just like Soobin, the older one is stuck inside his room finishing god knows what type of college assignments out there; hence why they only see each other only at lunch or dinner. That, only if his mother tells his hyung to go downstairs and take the plates himself.

(“Hyung, you’re not gonna have your breakfast here?”

“Nah, I’m good. Gonna take this upstairs while I finish a few stuff.”

“Oh, a’ight. Good luck.”)

His parents.. well, Soobin understands well. They’re working hard as freelancers, but things got tougher now that the pandemic is slackening everything, including their jobs.

In short, they’re running out of both money and food.

That can be a little too stressful to handle. His parents never talked about it in front of him, though. But Soobin isn’t that dumb to notice how two weeks after going through quarantine, their dinner started to thin out by just eating side dishes and rice, and it goes like that until now. Side dishes and rice, side dishes and rice, that’s it. They used to have chicken or ramyeon twice or three times a week, but Soobin had never _seen_ them physically for almost a month now. Soobin isn’t that dumb to notice how their parents have serious conversations with each other and he’d always hear words related to his hyung’s college and college fees. He’d sometimes hear words about his noona’s financial issues of her own family as well. They’re really running out of money and Soobin understands well why his parents, especially his mother, gets a tad bit cranky at the end of the day; yelling at him when he knew she could’ve just told him slowly, one by one, just like how she used to. Soobin finish your homeworks, Soobin don’t play with your phone too long, Soobin this, Soobin that.

Don’t get me wrong. Nothing’s wrong with her naggings, but _god_ , Soobin is very much stressed as well and this is why he procrastinated before doing that goddamn geography project. He needed a _timeout._ He needed sleep, and he did just that.

And that brings to his situation now, onto why he feels really, really off. Sure, the geography thing succeeded, the email was already sent and he can go rest, especially now that it’s almost 1 in the morning. But Soobin has never felt this confused before, something just feels really off. It’s as if he had lost _everything_ , but he didn’t know what they were.

What does he do at times like this, you ask me? He talks to his one and only best friend.

ㅡ

( _“Oh, Soobin-ah? Why are you calling me this late?”_

“Jjuni hyung,” Soobin smiles through the phone, the soft sounds of keyboard typings really are soothing. “You’re still awake?”

 _“What a weird question,”_ this time, Yeonjun laughs and it sounds so scratchy, Soobin almost grimaces. _“Why’d you call me, dumbass? You know you can like.. come here instead, right?”_

“Exactly. Can I come?”

 _“I’m not sure,”_ Yeonjun clears his throat. _“Is something wrong?”_

“Nothing’s wrong, I just wanna sleep on your bed.”

 _“Oh,”_ he breathes out a chuckle, and it somewhat tickles Soobin through the phone. _“Okay, come here. Don’t forget to wear your mask.”_

Soobin doesn’t realize it but he ends up rolling his eyes.)

Choi Soobin doesn’t ignore the fact that the constant normal talk he did was just him putting up bricks around his feelings. Yeonjun wouldn’t have wanted to see him all stressed, he knows that. What Soobin said was out of pure pretension, but he also doesn’t want to ignore the fact that talking to his favorite hyung might’ve just added a whole brand new lifespan inside him. And that was through a phone call! He wonders if he can feel somewhat immortal now that he’s upstairs, knocking on his brother’s bedroom door.

“Jjuni hyung,” he called out. “It’s Soobin.”

He entered the room once he heard a small _come on in_ and felt that same confusing feeling back again. Really, just plain weird. The minute he smelled the signature scent of Yeonjun’s room and the way their childhood pictures decorated the walls just made him feel things again. It’s like, I don’t know, he feels off and he can’t figure out why.

“Earth to Soobin?”

And now his hyung is standing right in front of him, woah. How long did he zone out?

“Get your ass inside,” Yeonjun muttered under his breath, and the door creaked out a sigh when it’s slowly closed after they’re both swarmed in the warm atmosphere of the so-called _Yeonjun hyung’s nest_. “My bed’s all yours for the next few hours, by the way. I still have shit to do.”

“You really are busy, huh, hyung?”

And when Yeonjun sighed loudly this time, Soobin felt like his chest is swelling. Is he experiencing the same thing Soobin did? “Mhm, what else do you expect?”

Soobin plopped down to his hyung’s drafting chair, eyes travelling to Yeonjun’s laptop on sleep mode. “Can I borrow this first, hyung?”

“Borrow what?”

“This,” he pulled the chair closer to the desk. “I can’t sleep so let me watch something.”

“Fine, but only five minutes,” with a phone in hand, Yeonjun sat down on his own bed which is positioned right beside his desk and spared Soobin a look, it hurt the bunny boy’s dignity for a bit. “Be grateful I’m taking a break now.”

He didn’t answer and let his fingers do the work for now. He turned the laptop back on, and searched something on Youtube.

_Oggy and The Cockroaches._

It’s funny, really. The cartoon doesn’t have any voice actors and Soobin, being the proud non-multilingual Korean he is, had understood this cartoon ever since he was just twelve. Both him and Yeonjun, actually. Sure, his brother understands English, but they _loved_ Oggy a lot back then. So when the painfully iconic soundtrack for the opening blasted up, Yeonjun had to look away from his phone.

“Oggy?” Yeonjun laughed, groggy. “You’re kidding.”

“I miss Oggy, shut up.”

And he did, and watched the episode in silence, together. Soobin eventually noticed that Yeonjun’s watching this too, and he couldn’t help the fact that his stomach felt so weird, it’s like something’s about to drop.

And once the annoying chorus of the intro song passed, Soobin smiled. There’s a glint of a past memory of him and his friends at school. A glint of him playing hide and seek with Yeonjun when they’re still kids.

“Remember how we’ve always hated the intro song but we ended up singing them when we entered that scary ass escape room?” Yeonjun laughed, a soft and yet triggering voice for Soobin and he’s just _so_ weak for this. Why did he have to do that?

“Good ole days,” Yeonjun continued.

The episode went on, and Soobin couldn’t help the tremble from his whole body. His throat _hurt_ , his eyes couldn’t even see the goddamn annoying colored cockroaches through the screen and he’s _shaking_. Soobin then sobbed, which caught the older off-guard. “Hyung.”

“Oh, fuck, Soobin-”

He’s still shaking. Everything’s going so fast and his heart skipped so many beats on every second.

“Soobin, baby, hey,” Yeonjun’s voice sounded so fucking soft and Soobin hated it. It only made him shake more, with the choked sobs being held as best as he could but what could he do, really? Everything broke down once Yeonjun gently turned the chair over to his side, and went down on the floor. With knees bent, he levelled himself with Soobin’s seat, and started _hugging_ him.

“Hyung, stop,” he hiccuped. “I don’t know why I’m feeling like this, don’t make me feel worse.”

“Shh, hey, okay. You’re okay,” Yeonjun laughed softly out of nervousness, and he kept giving his brother back rubs, the other free hand scrambling around the desk to pause the cartoon. “Okay, breathe with me. Breathe.”

He couldn’t. More glimpses of his past memories rolled on like an old movie in the back of his eyes, and it’s hurting him so much to the point that he felt like his throat is getting bigger. Everything passed on his mind. He remembered his last day of school where he had to ask for Beomgyu’s notes because he accidentally slept on biology class, went home, and then the next day, the pandemic forced his school to shut down. He could still remember how Beomgyu teased him for being unable to read the younger one’s handwriting, he could still remember the faint light of the windows’ class shining through and he could still remember _finally_ walking back home after hours being in _hell_. But now, he felt like calling his school as hell might’ve been too harsh, and the guilt was really, really hurting him.

“I c-” Soobin’s breath spasmed on his hyung’s shoulder, eyes opening and closing so hard he just wanted to stop the memories. “I can’t, I can’t.”

“Breathe, Bin-ah. Listen to me breathe,” Yeonjun backed his head away, facing the younger and held the eye-contact as long as he could. He muttered something along _inhale_ s and _exhale_ s and Soobin eventually followed him, to which he could feel his own throat being not as painful as before.

But the tears won’t stop, and the thought of his own brother itself just worsened things deep down inside his heart.

“I’m t-” Soobin paused. “Tired, hyung. Quarantine fucking sucked.”

“Hey,” Yeonjun smiled, giving more back rubs and he hugged him again. “You’re right, it did suck. But guess what?”

Soobin stayed silent, listening.

“This will end, I promise. You didn’t lose everything, this is just..” Yeonjun’s mind drifted, lips pouting, “..what? A virus? Oh, fuck them. They can do whatever they want as long as we’re huddled up together in this closed nest. We just gotta support- you know, our superhero doctors and medics out there.”

“Yeah,” Soobin hiccuped a laugh, wiping the tears away. “But I miss everyone, even that one dude who kept on snitching on me at school.”

He then continued, “and I don’t.. God, I don’t know. Homeworks sucked my energy as well and I hate it so much-”

“Don’t do them,” Yeonjun sighed for the umpteenth time that morning, putting his chin on the younger’s shoulder. “If they’re tiring you out, don’t do those homeworks. I can tell mom about it, I’m sure she’d understand. Just, let me do the talk and you’re gonna be okay.”

“Really?” Oh, god, he’s about to cry again.

“What’s more important than education, you ask?” Yeonjun backed away from the hug, and gave the younger his warmest smile, hands intertwined together like actual puzzles and he chuckled. “Your health, mental and all. Some might disagree, but I don’t care. If mom kicks us out of the house in between these days of the pandemic because of you not finishing your school stuff then..”

_Then..?_

“Then so be it, really. We run away from this shithole once and for all, yeah? I’ve had this thought lately because- fuck, college had me going crazy as well. Don’t worry, I’m with you.”

Soobin laughed through his tears, whining, “Hyung..”

“Yeah? What do you think?”

“Okay.”

“Okay? You up with that?”

“’ng,” Soobin mumbled, still giggling softly.

“Alright, bunny. I’m with you.”

[ With tired hearts and smiley faces, Yeonjun ended up sleeping on his own bed with his little brother’s tummy as his little pillow, with hushed whispers and scary stories left unsaid (they were tired, after all). Both felt like they’ve lost a shit ton of things in life since the quarantine started, but no worries, they have each other for now. ]

**Author's Note:**

> heheh


End file.
